I’m always fascinated by so-called “designer funerals.”  You know the ones—where the deceased has left some elaborate last wishes for their funeral.  Columnist Gina Gallo writes of this absurdity, describing a “gaming theme” funeral:

“For a nominal deposit and low monthly payments, a ‘gaming theme’ funeral offers authentic slot machines discreetly positioned around the neon-lit casket, gambling chips the size of manhole covers, and a jumbo deck of cards in lieu of a flower spray covering the deceased. Instead of folding chairs, jumbo dice scattered about the viewing parlor will serve as ottomans, cocktail tables or the perfect surface for a memorial craps game.”

We don’t know what to do with death, so we try to domesticate it as if it were a wild dog.  But death refuses to be reasoned or bartered with.  Since the day we left Paradise, we breathe out, and death is no more.

SHALOM STORY

It’s why we have to keep coming back to the concept of shalom—the Hebrew word meaning “wholeness,” “completeness”—the way things were meant to be all along.  Man was made to experience shalom in three dimensions: spiritually (between man and God), socially (between man and neighbor), and environmentally (between man and creation).  Sin ripped all of these apart.  The gospel is about putting shalom back together again.  The cross removes my sin, allowing me to be spiritually restored to God (spiritual shalom).  And because it happens by grace, it removes the sense of superiority and inferiority that prevents me from fully loving my neighbor—thus restoring social shalom.

But that leaves one final piece for God to fix.  That’s why I cringe when I hear people speak of being “complete in Christ”—because I’m not.  I get sick.  I will one day die.  Death is all around me, whether in a designer funeral or the evening news.  In the words of the rock band U2, “I still haven’t found what I’m looking for.” I truly believe that one of the reasons so many are quick to dismiss Christianity is because we expect happiness to be immediate—and lasting.  The gospel says no; we have to wait for the end of the story.  We need to see the restoration of environmental shalom.

That’s what Isaiah’s text is all about.  The latter portion of his prophetic masterpiece details God’s future plans for restoring shalom in all areas of life.

¹⁷ For look, I am ready to create new heavens and a new earth! The former ones will not be remembered; no one will think about them anymore.  ¹⁸ But be happy and rejoice forevermore over what I am about to create! For look, I am ready to create Jerusalem to be a source of joy, and her people to be a source of happiness.  ¹⁹ Jerusalem will bring me joy, and my people will bring me happiness. The sound of weeping or cries of sorrow will never be heard in her again.  ²⁰ Never again will one of her infants live just a few days or an old man die before his time. Indeed, no one will die before the age of a hundred, anyone who fails to reach the age of a hundred will be considered cursed.  ²¹ They will build houses and live in them; they will plant vineyards and eat their fruit.  ²² No longer will they build a house only to have another live in it, or plant a vineyard only to have another eat its fruit, for my people will live as long as trees, and my chosen ones will enjoy to the fullest what they have produced.  ²³ They will not work in vain, or give birth to children that will experience disaster. For the LORD will bless their children and their descendants.  ²⁴ Before they even call out, I will respond; while they are still speaking, I will hear.  ²⁵ A wolf and a lamb will graze together; a lion, like an ox, will eat straw, and a snake’s food will be dirt. They will no longer injure or destroy on my entire royal mountain,” says the LORD.  (Isaiah 65:17-25)

I believe in heaven; I just don’t believe this is our destiny.  We were created for earth, you and I.  That’s partly what separates the Christian story from every other religious tradition.  Other religions promise some form of “escape” from earth—whether a literal heaven or some ethereal state like Moksha or Nirvana.  Christianity is the only faith that says that God will restore the earth.

1,000 YEARS

This means there are some features to this text that might seem confusing.  If this is God’s perfect world, why does he speak of death at all (v. 20)?  We won’t live to 100—we’ll live forever, right?  I tend to think that God—through Isaiah—is hinting at the larger story that we don’t see unfold until John’s book of Revelation.  There—in Revelation 19:1-6—we see a promise that God will reign on earth for 1,000 years before He finally completes the work of restoration.  Granted, there are many ways of understanding this complex subject, but I tend to believe the most literal reading of scripture tells us that on an undisclosed day, the church will be taken away (“raptured,” to use today’s terms).  Following a seven-year period of judgment (the “tribulation”), Christ will return to rule and reign for 1,000 years.  During this time, Satan will be bound.  Yet I tend to believe that death and sin will still persist.  Why?  Because man is depraved, and for the first time we’ll see what life is like when we can no longer say “the devil made me do it.”

It’s only after this that we see God restoring all things to goodness and perfection:

Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and earth had ceased to exist, and the sea existed no more.  ² And I saw the holy city– the new Jerusalem– descending out of heaven from God, made ready like a bride adorned for her husband.  ³ And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying: “Look! The residence of God is among human beings. He will live among them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them.  ⁴ He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death will not exist any more– or mourning, or crying, or pain, for the former things have ceased to exist.” (Revelation 21:1-4)

I don’t know what happens to our memories—the Bible’s less than clear.  Will we remember the past at all?  Or will the future glory simply overshadow it?  And on that day—will it matter?

EUCATASTROPHE

Artistically, we’ve come to shun the “happy ending.”  Artistic expression demands that in film, movies show a gritty world where things don’t always work out in the trite way of fairy tales.  There’s just one problem: this isn’t what the public seems to want.  Recent data reveals that in 2013, nearly half of Americans hadn’t seen any of the films nominated for Academy Awards.  Apparently people are eschewing films such as The Wolf of Wall Street and The Dallas Buyers’ Club, favoring films like Disney’s Frozen or Iron Man 3—movies that chronicle sacrifice, and happy endings.  Could it be that we are all uniquely wired to believe in happy endings?

In a famous essay entitled “On Fairy Stories,” J.R.R. Tolkien coined the term eucatastrophe—literally “good catastrophe”—what Tolkien calls “the sudden happy turn in a story which pierces you with a joy that brings tears.”  The gospel represents the ultimate “eucatastrophe.”  It promises that death does not have the last word—and that shalom might finally be restored.

I can remember an old Peanuts cartoon, where Charlie and Linus pass by a sign that reads “Jesus is the answer!”  In the next panel, Linus turns to Charlie and asks, “What was the question?”

The question changes everything.  The way we define the problem shapes the way we view the Solution.  In today’s world, it’s easy to forget just how much of a problem “sin” truly is—both inside and outside the church.

If you don’t have a background in church, then “sin” must sound like a throwback to an archaic, “Leave-it-to-Beaver” style America where we frowned at anything fun and women were burned as witches for learning math.  But in the fourth century, a man named Saint Augustine wrote that sin is a form of “dis-ordered” love.  Think of your heart as a pyramid.   You will never flourish, Augustine would say, until God rests at its apex.  All other loves are meant to occupy the lesser spaces below.  And we know this, even implicitly.  If I love possessions more than people, my soul withers under greed’s dark shadow.  If I become preoccupied with sex, I become a prisoner of lust.  Even the self-esteem movement has recently conceded that high self-esteem can often lead to self-absorption.  Nothing is more caustic than our devotion to self.

But if I come from within the church, then I tend to minimize sin as merely “doing bad things.”  I can learn to “manage” sin through a codified system of behavior and morals.  And that’ll never work, the Bible says, because nothing can erase the damage that’s already been done.

All of that serves as backdrop to the story of the Lamb.

THE SUFFERING SERVANT

One of the keys to understanding Isaiah is to recognize the “suffering servant” passages that appear in the latter half of his text.  These texts point to an idealized servant of God whose suffering is part of God’s larger redemptive framework of creation, fall, and redemption.

In the larger picture of the Bible, we can easily see the way that Jesus is the true and better servant.  All of these texts point to His atoning work on the cross.  In his excellent work The Apostolic Preaching of the Cross, Leon Morris observes that over time, Israel came to see all shed blood as atoning for sin—meaning every sacrificial lamb, goat, etc. were viewed as having the same purifying quality.  So when we later hear John the Baptist refer to Jesus as “the Lamb of God who lifts away the sin of humanity” (John 1:29, 36), he’s saying that Jesus fulfills this sacrificial system once and for all.

But we get ahead of ourselves.  Let’s take a look at what Isaiah had to say about this servant:

Isaiah 53:1-12  Who would have believed what we just heard? When was the LORD’s power revealed  him?  ² He sprouted up like a twig before God, like a root out of parched soil; he had no stately form or majesty that might catch our attention, no special appearance that we should want to follow him.  ³ He was despised and rejected by people, one who experienced pain and was acquainted with illness; people hid their faces from him; he was despised, and we considered him insignificant.

Growing up I’d always wondered why Jesus’ earliest followers were so quick to cast aside their lucrative fishing careers to follow a guy they’d never met.  One ancient writer thought that “there must have been some divine quality in the face of the Savior.”  And I hate that, because it just smacks of bad Sunday School art that depicts Jesus as a white guy with feathered hair who looks suspiciously like Kenny Loggins.  But if Isaiah is right, that “he had no stately form or majesty that might catch our attention,” then it means that Jesus was never one of the “popular” crowd.  Instead, I tend to think the early disciples were drawn to a message of hope and forgiveness—something they’d never find on the inside of their tacklebox.

⁴ But he lifted up our illnesses, he carried our pain; even though we thought he was being punished, attacked by God, and afflicted for something he had done.  ⁵ He was wounded because of our rebellious deeds, crushed because of our sins; he endured punishment that made us well; because of his wounds we have been healed. ⁶ All of us had wandered off like sheep; each of us had strayed off on his own path, but the LORD caused the sin of all of us to attack him.  ⁷ He was treated harshly and afflicted, but he did not even open his mouth. Like a lamb led to the slaughtering block, like a sheep silent before her shearers, he did not even open his mouth.  ⁸ He was led away after an unjust trial– but who even cared? Indeed, he was cut off from the land of the living; because of the rebellion of his own people he was wounded.  ⁹ They intended to bury him with criminals, but he ended up in a rich man’s tomb, because he had committed no violent deeds, nor had he spoken deceitfully.  ¹⁰ Though the LORD desired to crush him and make him ill, once restitution is made, he will see descendants and enjoy long life, and the LORD’s purpose will be accomplished through him.  ¹¹ Having suffered, he will reflect on his work, he will be satisfied when he understands what he has done. “My servant will acquit many, for he carried their sins.  ¹² So I will assign him a portion with the multitudes, he will divide the spoils of victory with the powerful, because he willingly submitted to death and was numbered with the rebels, when he lifted up the sin of many and intervened on behalf of the rebels.”

We could go on for hours unpacking all this.  But here we have the gospel in its purest form.

First, Isaiah sees sin as a universal form of disobedience.  But in the same breath, Isaiah says that God “caused the sin of us all to attack him.”  Keep in mind, the cross was more than a death sentence.  It was designed to not only inflict pain, but also to bring shame.  Jesus paid for our sin—and he also paid for the consequences of sin—the shame, the blame that began in Paradise long ago.

“Because of his wounds,” Isaiah tells us, “we are healed.”  The “punishment that made us well,” Isaiah calls it.  If you’re reading that in the original Hebrew, you’d instantly notice the word shalom.  The word—as we’ve noted before—refers to God’s peace, joy, and wholeness.  It refers to what Cornelius Plantinga calls “the way it’s supposed to be.”  Jesus puts everything back together again, and repairs what you and I broke.

Do you see why the idea of sin is so necessary?  Let’s go back to Linus and Charlie—the way the question shapes our view of the Answer.  If our greatest problem is social, then when I look to Jesus I expect to see another social revolutionary—another Gandhi.  If our greatest problem is moral, then when I look to Jesus I expect to find a religious teacher.  If our greatest problem is intolerance, then when I look to Jesus I expect to find a spiritual and ethical visionary.  But if our greatest problem is sin, then when I look to Jesus I can’t be satisfied with just another religious figure.  I need forgiveness.  I need a Lamb.

The story of Christianity is a story of how God provided what man could not: a sacrifice that would eradicate the stain of sin once and for all.  For humanity, faith marks the boundary between a life of sin and a life with God.

Has this ever happened to you?  You need something.  You go shopping.  But once you enter the store, you realize you can’t afford anything they sell.

I can remember a few years ago I needed a pair of dress shoes.  So I found myself entering a shoe store at the local outlet mall.  At the door, I was greeted by a pair of grandmotherly-types who welcomed me to the otherwise-empty store, and handed me a piece of butterscotch candy to enjoy while I perused their wares.  But as I did so, I discovered two things: (1) I thought all their shoes were weird (tassels? People like tassels?) and (2) the cheapest pair they sold started at around $75 or so—though most were significantly more.  So there I was.  No intention—or financial means—to make a purchase, trying to avoid eye contact with the pair of salesladies, grinning ear to ear as they watched their sole customer enjoy their butterscotch candy, seemingly unaware that he was fake shopping so as not to appear ungrateful.

It was awkward.

And the truth is, I can’t help but wonder if that’s how a lot of people feel about church.  I mean, there’s no shortage of churches handing out butterscotch candy, is there?  I’ve lived in Dallas—the nightmarish capital of the evangelical world—so I’ve seen some of the absurdity that abounds.  Gyms.  Ferris wheels.  Some churches have even given away things ranging from gasoline to electronics.  At tax season, some churches even offer shredding services, sure to cater to those ranging from savvy professionals to corrupt bureaucrats.

Here’s the problem: you enjoy those services for so long, until you start to realize what the cost really is.  Soon you begin to hear about what God expects from you, and if the gospel is absent what you’re left with is a pile of moralistic demands.  If you’re good, you hear, God will love you. 

If I’m good?  Well, in today’s evangelical culture that means not just abstaining from the big sins like pornography and Disney movies,  but also paying the cost that comes from Christian culture.  Christian radio, Christian films, Christian music, Christian coffeehouses, Christian schools, Christian gyms (yes; those exist)—and once you join a small group (usually with a name like JUICE or VOLT or TRANCE or something) you’d better get working on your Christian lingo, ranging from “quiet time” to “guarding your heart,” after which you pray for something called “traveling mercies” even though you live two blocks away.

And I think that a lot of people come, enjoy the butterscotch, but they end up fake-shopping because they don’t want to shatter the smiles of the people that brought them in the door.  But deep down, it’s hard to really “buy in” to the culture of the church when you feel like there’s nothing in your pocket that allows you to afford it.

Enter the gospel.

SAVED BY GRACE

Remember that Isaiah is talking about what life would look like if God reigned completely—on earth as it is in heaven, so to speak.  And, as we already noted, this is what life will look like in the new heavens and the new earth.

I love this passage, because what better way to illustrate the free gift of God’s grace:

“Hey, all who are thirsty, come to the water! You who have no money, come! Buy and eat! Come! Buy wine and milk without money and without cost!  ² Why pay money for something that will not nourish you? Why spend your hard-earned money on something that will not satisfy? Listen carefully to me and eat what is nourishing! Enjoy fine food!  ³ Pay attention and come to me! Listen, so you can live! Then I will make an unconditional covenantal promise to you, just like the reliable covenantal promises I made to David.  ⁴ Look, I made him a witness to nations, a ruler and commander of nations.”  ⁵ Look, you will summon nations you did not previously know; nations that did not previously know you will run to you, because of the LORD your God, the Holy One of Israel, for he bestows honor on you. (Isaiah 55:1-5)

Grace.  It’s an incredible gift.  Isaiah didn’t even have the full picture in his day.  When we pause to consider the way Christ’s blood paid the debt of sin, we easily see how the gospel leads to great joy.  I experience God’s blessing not because I could “afford” it, but because it was secured for me through the blood of Jesus.

TRANSFORMED BY GRACE

But, you might object, surely God doesn’t just want us to remain as we are.  Surely he wants us to worship him with pure hearts and not stained garments.  And you’re right.  The problem is, we often think that means working really hard.

Martin Luther, the great sixteenth-century reformer, once compared the Christian life to building a house.  We allow Jesus to lay the foundation; then we wait for Moses to come finish the job.  In other words, people see Jesus as the ticket “in.”  Once we’re “saved,” we rely on God’s Laws to make us better.  But if we are saved by grace alone, how can we be transformed except through grace?

⁶ Seek the LORD while he makes himself available; call to him while he is nearby!  ⁷ The wicked need to abandon their lifestyle and sinful people their plans. They should return to the LORD, and he will show mercy to them, and to their God, for he will freely forgive them.  ⁸ “Indeed, my plans are not like your plans, and my deeds are not like your deeds,  ⁹ for just as the sky is higher than the earth, so my deeds are superior to your deeds and my plans superior to your plans.  ¹⁰ The rain and snow fall from the sky and do not return, but instead water the earth and make it produce and yield crops, and provide seed for the planter and food for those who must eat.  ¹¹ In the same way, the promise that I make does not return to me, having accomplished nothing. No, it is realized as I desire and is fulfilled as I intend.”  ¹² Indeed you will go out with joy; you will be led along in peace; the mountains and hills will give a joyful shout before you, and all the trees in the field will clap their hands.  ¹³ Evergreens will grow in place of thorn bushes, firs will grow in place of nettles; they will be a monument to the LORD, a permanent reminder that will remain.

Everything here is described as a joyous song.   Even the trees clap their hands.  Isaiah says that the distance between us and God is the same as the distance between the earth and heaven itself.  And that’s why the gospel is so beautiful.  No one can reach that far.  The gospel says that God comes down to us in the person of Jesus.

So what does this have to do with our sanctification—that is, with the process by which we are made into Christ’s likeness?  Everything.  Because it means that if I labor to obey God out of a need for his acceptance, then I either feel frustrated when I fail, or arrogantly self-righteous when I succeed.  But if I trust in God’s gracious power through His Spirit, then I can experience joy as He brings me ever closer to His side, and ever shapes me into someone who resembles His character.

What do you think of when you think of God?  An old man with a long white beard?  A cosmic judge?  An ineffectual grandfather, who winks at sin and pats our heads approvingly?

A number of years ago, a group of psychologists did an experiment to test the parental bonds formed in young monkeys.  The research animals were presented with two “surrogate” mothers.  The first offered food, but it was made of cold, steel wire.  The second offered no food, but it was made of soft cloth, made to resemble animal fur.  Which do you think the monkeys clung to?  That’s right; even though the soft cloth “surrogate” offered no food, no sustenance, the monkeys clung more tightly to its warmth than to the cold steel alternative.

And that’s what it’s like, for a lot of people.  Our lesser “gods”—sex, career, entertainment, you name it—offer us no substance or enduring value.  But they “seem” warmer, or offer more immediate security than a God that I can’t hear or see or touch.

But God is closer than we think, Isaiah tells us.  Isaiah’s prophecy offers us a rich, multi-textured portrait of God.  His righteousness collides violently with man’s wickedness, and in the aftermath we see the grace he extends to those who trust in His name.

GOD OF COMFORT

It’s hard to summarize Isaiah’s entire message in a few paragraphs.  In Isaiah chapters 1-39, Isaiah’s prophecy centers on the judgment coming to Israel.  Then, in chapter 40, the tone of the entire book shifts.  Now, Isaiah describes God as the One who comforts Israel following her return from exile.  Keep in mind, all of this is yet future.  If God knows the events of the future, then surely he can speak through Isaiah to describe the events following the time of exile.

But this also tells us something timelessly significant about the character of God.  The character that Isaiah describes here is the same God who will one day offer comfort to all people in the formation of the New Heavens and New Earth—themes that we will explore as we see Isaiah’s prophecy unfold before our eyes.

Comfort, comfort my people, says your God.  ² Speak tenderly to Jerusalem, and cry to her that her warfare is ended, that her iniquity is pardoned, that she has received from the LORD’s hand double for all her sins.  ³ A voice cries: “In the wilderness prepare the way of the LORD; make straight in the desert a highway for our God.  ⁴ Every valley shall be lifted up, and every mountain and hill be made low; the uneven ground shall become level, and the rough places a plain.  ⁵ And the glory of the LORD shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together, for the mouth of the LORD has spoken.”  ⁶ A voice says, “Cry!” And I said, “What shall I cry?” All flesh is grass, and all its beauty is like the flower of the field.  ⁷ The grass withers, the flower fades when the breath of the LORD blows on it; surely the people are grass.  ⁸ The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God will stand forever.  ⁹ Get you up to a high mountain, O Zion, herald of good news; lift up your voice with strength, O Jerusalem, herald of good news; lift it up, fear not; say to the cities of Judah, “Behold your God!”  ¹⁰ Behold, the Lord GOD comes with might, and his arm rules for him; behold, his reward is with him, and his recompense before him.  ¹¹ He will tend his flock like a shepherd; he will gather the lambs in his arms; he will carry them in his bosom, and gently lead those that are with young.  (Isaiah 40:1-11)

The promise of comfort announces that Israel’s “hard service” has been completed, and that “her sin has been paid for.”  Israel looked forward to a day when God would reign on earth as their earthly King.  They also looked forward to the day when God’s presence would be felt on earth in a more direct way than merely in the Temple.  What they never expected was that both these expectations would be fulfilled in the same person.  John the Baptist borrows language here to point to Jesus, the coming Messiah, who brings the presence of God up close and personal, and also points to Jesus’ coming role as King and Lord over His people.

It is a portrait that must be harmonized with the incredible display of God’s power, a theme that Isaiah elaborates on in the next section.

GOD OF POWER

 ¹² Who has measured the waters in the hollow of his hand and marked off the heavens with a span, enclosed the dust of the earth in a measure and weighed the mountains in scales and the hills in a balance?  ¹³ Who has measured the Spirit of the LORD, or what man shows him his counsel?  ¹⁴ Whom did he consult, and who made him understand? Who taught him the path of justice, and taught him knowledge, and showed him the way of understanding?  ¹⁵ Behold, the nations are like a drop from a bucket, and are accounted as the dust on the scales; behold, he takes up the coastlands like fine dust.  ¹⁶ Lebanon would not suffice for fuel, nor are its beasts enough for a burnt offering.  ¹⁷ All the nations are as nothing before him, they are accounted by him as less than nothing and emptiness.  ¹⁸ To whom then will you liken God, or what likeness compare with him?  ¹⁹ An idol! A craftsman casts it, and a goldsmith overlays it with gold and casts for it silver chains.  ²⁰ He who is too impoverished for an offering chooses wood that will not rot; he seeks out a skillful craftsman to set up an idol that will not move.  ²¹ Do you not know? Do you not hear? Has it not been told you from the beginning? Have you not understood from the foundations of the earth?  ²² It is he who sits above the circle of the earth, and its inhabitants are like grasshoppers; who stretches out the heavens like a curtain, and spreads them like a tent to dwell in;  ²³ who brings princes to nothing, and makes the rulers of the earth as emptiness.  ²⁴ Scarcely are they planted, scarcely sown, scarcely has their stem taken root in the earth, when he blows on them, and they wither, and the tempest carries them off like stubble.  ²⁵ To whom then will you compare me, that I should be like him? says the Holy One.  ²⁶ Lift up your eyes on high and see: who created these? He who brings out their host by number, calling them all by name, by the greatness of his might, and because he is strong in power not one is missing.  ²⁷ Why do you say, O Jacob, and speak, O Israel, “My way is hidden from the LORD, and my right is disregarded by my God”?  ²⁸ Have you not known? Have you not heard? The LORD is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He does not faint or grow weary; his understanding is unsearchable.  ²⁹ He gives power to the faint, and to him who has no might he increases strength.  ³⁰ Even youths shall faint and be weary, and young men shall fall exhausted;  ³¹ but they who wait for the LORD shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles; they shall run and not be weary; they shall walk and not faint. (Isaiah 40:12-31)

Stop and think.  Everything we believe about Jesus, we believe about God.  And I love that, because it means that when I read passages like this one from Isaiah, it gives me a deeper and wider understanding of just who Jesus was—and is—and ever shall be.

Too often we worship a god that best serves us.  But who wants a god that can fit in their jacket pocket?  This only deepens our commitment to self rather than call us away from it.  Where’s the comfort in that?  When trouble comes—and it will—what will you turn to?  The God of Isaiah’s text?  Or the god of our own imaginations?  Only one will truly offer us lasting strength, lasting peace, lasting power.

In the face of every child lies evidence that one of the earliest human faculties is a sense of wonder.  It’s a sense as basic to our design as hunger or thirst.   Ignore this design, this need for wonder—for beauty, for enthrallment—and your soul will wither like pile of dried leaves.

So often the world around us seems bled dry of both beauty and mystery.  In this world, Christianity must seem like a beautiful dream, but a dream nonetheless.  Surely we can’t possibly expect to see God’s face in a world like ours.

This was precisely what Isaiah felt.  The books of prophecy weren’t typically arranged in precise chronological order, so it seems likely that Isaiah really begins in the sixth chapter.  And it’s a chapter shadowed by death:

In the year that King Uzziah died I saw the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up; and the train of his robe filled the temple.

2 Above him stood the seraphim. Each had six wings: with two he covered his face, and with two he covered his feet, and with two he flew. 3 And one called to another and said:

“Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts;
the whole earth is full of his glory!”  (Isaiah 6:1-3)

We know from the pages of history that King Uzziah had died in the year 740 B.C., his kingdom passing to Jotham.  He’d been a good king—he’d strengthened the military, and bolstered the economy (2 Chronicles 26:1-14).  Now that he was gone, could Israel stand against their surrounding adversaries?

So in the midst of darkness, Isaiah caught a glimpse of hope.  Usually human beings weren’t allowed to see God and live to tell about it—but it was equally true that in an act of sheer grace, God chose to reveal himself to key individuals.  Was this a vision?  A dream?  Maybe some kind of “out-of-body experience?”  Isaiah doesn’t tell us, but the setting is the Temple.  As you surely remember from previous posts, the Temple was where the ancient Israelites (all religions, really) believed God uniquely and specifically dwelled.  Normally, a curtain would separate man from the innermost dwelling place—the “holy of holies” as it was known.  But now, nothing stands between Isaiah and God.  In his lengthy commentary on Isaiah, John Oswalt calls this scene “the raw edge of terror,” because it takes place “where humanity dare not go.”

And here’s what’s so stunning.  Isaiah can barely describe the details.  The only detail he mentions of God is “the train of his robe.”  Imagine your friend meets a celebrity.  You ask, “What did he/she look like?”  If the only thing they remember is the cuffs of their pants, you’d either conclude that they (1) didn’t really pay attention or (2) they were so overwhelmed this was all they could remember.

For Isaiah, it seems to be the second case.  The throne is surrounded by a cloud of seraphim. These weren’t angels—at least, not exactly.  The Hebrew name literally means “burning ones.”  These spectacular, multi-winged creatures seemed to play a unique role in surrounding God’s throne and declaring his glory.  Qadosh!  Qadosh!  Qadosh! they sang out: “holy holy holy is the Lord.”  Holiness becomes Isaiah’s key theme.  To be Holy means to be set apart.  And no one is more set apart than God.

4 And the foundations of the thresholds shook at the voice of him who called, and the house was filled with smoke. 5 And I said: “Woe is me! For I am lost; for I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts!”

6 Then one of the seraphim flew to me, having in his hand a burning coal that he had taken with tongs from the altar. 7 And he touched my mouth and said: “Behold, this has touched your lips; your guilt is taken away, and your sin atoned for.”

8 And I heard the voice of the Lord saying, “Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?” Then I said, “Here am I! Send me.” (Isaiah 6:4-8)

Have you ever met someone important, only to later learn you had a stain on your shirt, or your fly was down?  Something similar was going on here—only magnified a thousandfold.  To be in the presence of holiness would have indeed been terrifying.  Readers are meant to see this whole scene as filled with raw emotion—almost a sense of violence at the intensity of the moment.

Some take Isaiah’s concerns literally—that maybe he had a problem with strong language, or liked to tell “dirty jokes.”  Maybe.  Or maybe Isaiah was simply highlighting his own unworthiness to even speak in the presence of God.

The seraph purified Isaiah’s lips with a burning coal—a coal that could only have come from one of the altars in the temple.  The coal was associated with sacrifice.  Only through sacrifice can God make his people pure.

Isaiah was never exactly “called” by God.  He volunteered.  When he learned of God’s need—a need to address a nation’s desperate circumstances, he could only shout out “Here am I!  Send me!”

Most sermons stop there.  They shouldn’t.  Here is God’s mission briefing to Isaiah:

9 And he said, “Go, and say to this people:

“‘Keep on hearing,  but do not understand;
keep on seeing, but do not perceive.’
10 Make the heart of this people dull,
and their ears heavy,
and blind their eyes;
lest they see with their eyes,
and hear with their ears,
and understand with their hearts,
and turn and be healed.”
11 Then I said, “How long, O Lord?”
And he said:
“Until cities lie waste
without inhabitant,
and houses without people,
and the land is a desolate waste,
12 and the Lord removes people far away,
and the forsaken places are many in the midst of the land.
13 And though a tenth remain in it,
it will be burned again,
like a terebinth or an oak,
whose stump remains
when it is felled.”
The holy seed is its stump.

Somehow I wonder if Isaiah would have been as eager had he read the instructions.  He wasn’t called to success; he was called to faithfulness.  And so are we.

As you survey the entire scene, are you beginning to see how the pieces come together to form a snapshot of the gospel?   Isaiah—an unclean man in unclean times—stands before the throne of the God of the universe.  What greater picture of unworthiness could there be?  The only thing louder than the praise of the seraphim was the thudding beat of Isaiah’s wicked heart.  Yet through sacrifice, God purifies his child, and gives him a new identity and new mission.

The whole scene parallels Paul’s summary of the gospel:

…you were dead in the trespasses and sins  ² in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience–  ³ among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind.  ⁴ But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us,  ⁵ even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ–by grace you have been saved–  ⁶ and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus,  ⁷ so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.  ⁸ For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God,  ⁹ not a result of works, so that no one may boast.  ¹⁰ For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them. (Ephesians 2:1-10)

We live in a world where wonder is too often usurped by cynicism and fear.  There are no fairy tales, only ghost stories.  The gospel says that there is hope for those who place their trust in Jesus.  But the gospel also says that such hope comes with a high calling: a calling to faithfulness in a world full of faithlessness.  But through it all, we stand with a God who makes us pure, helps us stand, and shows us the Way.